Presents

Every time I look at it, it makes me smile.

I’ve never been one for much ornamentation, no ribbons or bows or lace to help with the architecture of my clothing. No flash of jewelry or decorated pins for my hair. I’m not sure why. It looks perfectly appropriate on others but somehow, it just doesn’t seem to fit.. me.

But the gift Lucian gave to me today fits me perfectly. Not only is the color fascinating to gaze into, but it holds within in it a part of him and Julian. He called it a birth-stone, a stone that represents the month in which both he and Julian were born. It makes me curious to see what my birth-stone would be.

I had something as well, something that was inadvertently for him. I had remembered that he had told me he changes for the better when he is around water, so I had a seamstress make a baby mobile of creatures from the sea. Probably silly on my part, but I thought if I did the nursery thus, it would create a calming effect, or at least be more esthetic to his senses.

He is a man who contains many mysteries, some of which I am privy to, tonight even more. I find myself often feeling defensive when I think he’s going to send me away. I don’t want to go. I want to be.. here. I’m not sure if he can understand why, or even if I can explain it properly.

But this time his secret could well fall into the hands of others. If they get too close, he’ll go underground.

I don’t think the House would like that.


Kurrost
I had thoughts of visiting the arena, but being it was so crowded the night previous, I decided, instead, to go to one of the parks. My mistake, since it seemed everyone else had visited the arena.

It was a pretty night, with the moons casting a silver blue light over the water. It’s like a picture I once saw for sale in the square, where the painter had caught the essence of surreal tranquility and trapped it, freezing it, for all the world to see. I wanted to step into the picture then, and here I was now, staring at it.

That is, until the hairs on my arms started to rise.

I’ve always had an odd sense of knowing when I was being watched. In fact, I’ve had this feeling several times in the last few days. Of course, when I turn, there is no one there and I chalk it up to the odd effects this pregnancy seems to be having on me.

But tonight it was different, there was a disturbance. It was in the air, heavy, forceful.. fretful, closer, as if I might be touched at any moment. I did something I normally do not do. I called out to it. And tonight, it answered back.

I accused him of following me that first night when we met on the street, after I’d read for the second assassin, and I had felt silly afterward. Now I wasn’t feeling as irrational. He was following me. But why. It was a question I put to him immediately.

He still talks in riddles, but he doesn’t seem quite as insane as before, as if he’s at last found answers, and the haze of his world is beginning to wane. He circled half way around me, cutting off my path to the gate. I was the Timegazer, he said, so I should know why.

Because he did not yet have all his answers, that I still held the key to some secret, something he needed to be whole again. I tried to explain to him that it wasn’t me, it was the cards. The signs of agitation were quick to arise, and he began to pull off his gloves, dropping them to the dirt between us, one bare hand reaching out to cup my face, while the other caressed over my cheekbone and down along my jaw. He was memorizing me, touching me as if.. all the answers were there, set within flesh. I flinched.

His hands dropped and he turned away, talking to himself. I now know the killer’s name.

Kurrost.